By now, most of you already know what happened last Sunday at the Reno-Tahoe Open, but we never got the chance to give it the attention it deserved on the blog. So here, in the interests of discussion, outrage and appreciation of Pat Perez’s embarrassment, is a post I put together earlier for The Score.

BY MOST STANDARDS, Pat Perez is a very good golfer. He’s a PGA Tour winner and has banked millions of dollars in a career that’s spanned most of the last decade. But ask most of his peers about Pat Perez and they’ll tell you he’s an underachiever. A stand-out at the junior and college level, he’s never quite fulfilled his talent at the highest level. Why?

Because Pat Perez has anger issues.

He’s been fined by the Tour and censured by television executives, even made the subject of a staged intervention by his parents (no, really…), yet he remains never more than an untimely missed putt or blocked drive away from meltdown. Broken clubs, the screaming of profanities, drivers sent cartwheeling into nearby shrubbery: he’s done it all. And thanks to some stellar camerawork at last week’s Tour stop, we now know he’s capable of reducing unfortunate children to tears.

Playing in the final round of the Reno-Tahoe Open– an event stage opposite the elite WGC-Bridgestone Invitational– Perez found himself in contention heading into the back nine. Time and again he left himself with makeable birdie opportunities; time and again he failed to convert. Eventually, he found himself standing by the eighteenth green, watching Scott Piercy cruise to a comfortable, tournament-winning par. Knowing that any one of a handful of short missed putts would have been enough to secure a play-off berth, it all became too much for the Arizonan.

“Perez stomped up a cart path and began his tantrum by ripping a water bottle from his pocket and slamming it onto the ground. A few feet later, he passed two little boys. Both were asking for autographs, and one was also holding out a water bottle for Perez. Visibly angry, Perez rushed past the boys with such rage that one of them broke into tears. A few feet later, Perez ripped the bottom of his shirt from his pants and slammed his golf glove onto the cart path.”

Video of the incident briefly made it to YouTube before the PGA Tour’s legal department, which has developed a nice line in deleting embarrassing Pat Perez videos, sprang into action. The golfer himself has since used his Twitter account to issue an apology for his “unprofessional” hilarious acts and launched a campaign to find the emotionally-fragile child in question.

This guy needs to control himself better. As a person who was known for throwing things (golf clubs, tennis racquets,basbeall gloves, etc) , I can tell him you do get past it. Took me time though. he should be able to control it 99.9% of the time. Maybe he needs a heavy bag to punch at home.

Kids at tournaments should be schooled by their parents on do’s and don’ts about when to approach players. Good teaching time for parents. All that being said, players have always been prickly at times dealing with fans. I remember approaching Arnie going on 60 years ago, and I assure you he was not always the warm and fuzzy guy we all respect and love now.

Would be a good story if it were true. Well, it’s half true. Perez did storm off the green. The part about the kid bursting into tears? Not exactly. After offering the water bottle to Perez (brave kid), and being rebuffed, the kid did a mocking “I’m shocked!” face and then broke into a big smile. Watching half of a YouTube clip one reporter interpreted it as tears. Following the Twitter reporter, ten dozen others assumed it was true.

Unfortunately most reporters and Twitter addicts didn’t bother to watch the video of the actual event to see what really happeened. Sure it was removed from YouTube but real reporters should have been able to get it from The Golf Channel where it was replayed.

Ah, the good old days. When journalists actually based stories on what really happened not on what sells papers or screen views.

Oh Please! I saw the whole thing live. The kid didn’t cry he made a fake crying face. My kids do it all the time when they don’t get something they want. This kid did the fake cry for about 2 seconds then went on with his life.

So Perez was upset, who cares. Maybe he chucks clubs in the bushes from time to time, big deal. Follow him one day and you might just get a free driver out of it.

Pat Perez is a super cool guy? . . . Really? . . . It’s cool to act like a spoiled rotten child live on network television? . . . Does the word “professional” mean anything to the PGA Tour? . . . If it does they give him the rest of the year off to address his “issues.” The issue is NOT did some kid cry or not . . . If you saw it live on TGC – as I did – it was amazing behavior from a 30 year old person who makes a 7 figure income in the sports entertainment business.

First off, this site, in addition to providing some on-site coverage, is a news aggregator. That means that we take stories currently in circulation and either evaluate them or repackage them for our audience’s consumption.

When it came to the above post on Pat Perez, I based my story on the information available to the public at the time and tried to put an amusing spin on it. Whether that aspect of the post succeeded or not is entirely a matter of personal taste.

Secondly, whether or not Pat Perez actually made the child in question cry is kind of immaterial. The comic value here is to be found in the ludicrous and embarrassing sight of a multi-millionaire comporting himself like a child. That aspect of the story is beyond question.

As, I should add, is Perez’s pretty disgraceful conduct on Twitter this evening. (I’m talking about a certain, since-deleted tweet targeted at this publication.)

South Beach……Word on the street is Duval and Ogilvie are a couple of horses arses. Thus a meeting with Perez at the right moment (like after the Tahoe event!) might straighten them out. I threw in Lickliter because he is a bit of a hothead so I thought it would be a good battle as to who would be victorious!!! But you are also right with Sabbatini…

Interesting comeback from Conor. I didn’t realize that this site just exists to post content from other people and make it funny without regard to the truth. I thought Stephanie Wei, with her ESPN and WSJ credentials, wanted to be thought of a serious journalist even when she has other people writing on her site. Interesting to know that’s not true.

I don’t think basing a response on the available information counts as any sort of dereliction of duty, nor do I think the primary thrust of the story (ie. Pat Perez is a child) is in any way compromised by new (unsubstantiated) information coming to light.

I also think you’re more than touch confused on the subject of journalistic best practice. Aggregation isn’t some kind of secretive, illegitimate process. For better or worse, it’s modern journalism’s default setting.

You seem to be suggesting that we should only report on things we’ve been present to see in person. That’s a completely impractical proposition, akin to saying people can’t hold opinions about things they haven’t directly experienced.

Just for the sake of argument, if the primary thrust of the story is that Perez is a child, then why is the headline, Pat Perez Makes Children Cry? And, why is the post tagged Abuse of Children.

I understand that this post is mostly for a laugh, but don’t you think those are a bit inflammatory and misleading? I mean, Pat Throws Another Temper Tantrum or something like that would seem more appropriate, especially given your clarification on the point of the article.

And, if it seems apparent that the kid actually wasn’t that upset about the whole thing, don’t you think it’s worth mentioning that?

I wonder if this Rick Lipsey has clarified his story at all, he seems to be the one that really jumped the gun.

No. Just no. Conor & Steph, please don’t just be a news aggregator. That shirks responsibility. Let’s not be lazy and/or sensationalist around here. Do the job and figure out what’s real (JOURNALISM), and tell us about that.

If we want same old stories, we can go everywhere else. It’s like I just said in the Westwood thread, no need to make up facts. Give us the facts, be well-rounded. Say, “Perez is a big immature baby, even though certain things are blown out of proportion, and he said something rude on Twitter.” It’s fine to mix commentary in to your reports, I think we all expect that nowadays; but at least gets facts right.